


And the Moon Is No Dream

by littleskywatcher



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Young Wizards - Diane Duane
Genre: F/F, Originally Posted on Tumblr, it's there if you squint okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-16
Updated: 2016-02-16
Packaged: 2018-05-20 23:13:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6028957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleskywatcher/pseuds/littleskywatcher
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Fury's death, Nita gets an unexpected nighttime visitor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And the Moon Is No Dream

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Stars, Rain, Sun, Moon](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1506209) by [adiva_calandia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/adiva_calandia/pseuds/adiva_calandia). 



Nita’s couch squeaks as someone perches on the other end. She opens one eye at the hissed curses that follow. “Hey, that’s no way to talk to my couch,” she mumbles into the pillow. _You’re not Clint_ , she realizes as her heart skips a beat.

“I—uh—I didn’t mean to wake you.”

Nita twists so Nat can see her roll her eyes. “I’ll assume that’s spy-speak for ‘I sometimes forget you can understand me if I swear in Russian’. If you didn’t mean to wake me, I wouldn’t know you’re here.” She abandons the pretense of even trying to sleep and sits up. “What’s up?”

“I was in the neighborhood, thought I’d drop in and—”

“Bull. I haven’t seen you since Fury died.” The statement ends up sounding a lot more like an accusation than she’d planned.

Nat looks up at her, guilty. “It’s not—” she starts, but Nita cuts her off with a sigh.

“It’s two thirty in the morning. I haven’t slept, you haven’t slept… Let’s not do this tonight, okay?” _Sometime when all three of us are in the same place at the same time_ , she doesn’t say. She feels Steve’s absence like an ache.

Nat looks at her lap, uncharacteristically silent. She looks as tired and worried as Nita’s felt for the last week, and her heart squeezes. Slowly, an idea creeps into her head.

“Hey,” she says suddenly, before she can change her mind. “I was going to go up to one of my thinking spots. You should come with me.”

“Sure?” It’s more agreement than Nita expected, so Nita picks up her phone and shoves the coffee table out of the way with her feet.

“Stand here,” she tells the other woman, pulling a graceful string of glowing characters seemingly out of the phone’s charging port. To her credit, Natasha only looks slightly bemused when Nita hands her a ‘contacts’ screen. “Fill that out, please. I have your number and some of this stuff already, but I need a little more information to get us where we’re going.” Nita pokes several points on the string, crunching numbers, and the places she pokes turn green. _I love it when my math checks out_ , she thinks as she drops the spell chain into a neat circle around them. Nat finishes entering her information and the spell updates itself, with Nat’s name in the Speech pulsing faintly. Nita squints at it, double-checking and storing the information for later. She figures it’s probably impolite to ask for anything more than verification at this point. Maybe one day, though… “All right,” she says finally, “once we get there, don’t leave the spell circle. You’ll probably understand why.” Nita hesitates. “You, uh, can hang onto me if you need to,” she adds quietly, hoping she wont’t be offended.

Nat looks at her wryly for a moment, but steps closer and takes Nita’s hand. Nita swallows a rush of pleasure, glances down at her phone, and starts to read.

The silence of an empty apartment in the wee hours transforms as the Universe leans in to listen to her request. Nita feels a brief pang at the absence of another voice raised with hers—she always does, spelling alone—but then she’s caught up in the spell and the feeling of Nat’s fingers crushing hers as they’re slammed out of one moment and into the next.

\---

Nita stands silent, letting the faint hiss of outer space whisper in her ears. It’s been awhile since she’s been to the Moon, and she welcomes the old familiarity. Beside her, she feels Nat relax out of her instinctive fighting crouch and stare around her in amazement. Wordlessly, Nita touches her arm and points to where the crescent Earth hangs like blue fire in the velvet sky. Nat gasps and sits down abruptly, heedless of the dust. Helpless wonder and terror, joy and sorrow, are at war across her face—it’s probably the first time Nita’s ever seen her so unguarded. Smiling ruefully at a memory, she whispers, “Some day, anyone who’s put into power down there will be brought up here, so they know exactly what they’re taking care of.” Nat just nods, her eyes overbright.

All that life down on Earth, Nat here next to her, and all the events of the past week are suddenly too much for Nita. She sits, too, putting her forehead on her updrawn knees and trying not to cry too loudly. To her complete surprise, Nat scoots closer, puts her arms around her, and leans her head against her shoulder. It’s been a rough week. Nita grabs her hands and holds on for dear life. They stay that way for a long time.

Finally Nita puts her head up and untangles her fingers from Nat’s long enough to wipe her face. She feels rather than sees Nat doing the same. They pick each other up—neither feels much like talking—and this time Nat takes Nita’s hand without prompting. They pop into the darkness of Nita’s apartment and stand staring at each other.

Nita breaks the silence at last. “Thanks,” she mutters, shifting a little under Nat’s scrutiny. A beat, during which Nita is determinedly _not_ looking at Nat’s lips, and then Nat leans in and kisses her.

It’s a soft kiss, not deep, but all Nita can think is that if kissing Steve makes her feel safe, kissing Nat makes her feel like all hell is going to break loose and she’ll gladly follow Nat into it. Both feelings have their appeal, part of her observes giddily. Natasha grins against her lips and pulls away with a wicked glint in her eyes.

“Y’know, I can see why Steve likes you,” she tosses over her shoulder as she opens the window. “You do a good starry-eyed impression. If the two of you don’t work out—or maybe if you do—let me know.” She winks at the utterly dumbfounded Nita and disappears into the darkness, every inch the superspy—cool, confident, and very aware of her effect on other people.

Nita stares after her, feeling very much like a movie cliche. Eventually she shakes herself, crawls back onto the couch, wraps herself in a throw, and falls into an uneasy sleep. She wakes up in the morning to Clint at her kitchen table and is half-convinced the previous night had been a stress dream, except she has moon dust in her pockets. A phrase rises unbidden from her memory that makes her shiver all over.

_“…and the Moon is no dream…”_


End file.
